(Closed) Are there any reasons BESIDES religion for opposing same sex marriage?

My Fiance are getting married at a gorgeous farmhouse in Maine, that is owned by FI’s cousin and his partner. As my wedding day gets closer, I can’t help but feel sad that while our hosts have gone above and beyond in their generosity of letting us use their space, they don’t have the right to have their own wedding there. They have been together for 25 years. They deserve it so much more than we do.

My sister, the Maid/Matron of Honor, who is a conservative evangelical, doesn’t believe in gay marriage. We can’t get into a discussion without tempers flairing, which isn’t good so close to the wedding. So I thought I’d ask here. Are there any reasons BESIDES religion to be against gay marriage?

And, as an added bonus, if it is ok for the conservative evangelical defination of marriage to shape national policy, then isn’t it also acceptable for our laws reflect the Catholic definition, and prohibit divorce? If divorce was illegal because the bible says so, I wouldn’t be getting married because Fiance would still be with his crazy ex, and my sister wouldn’t be here because our dad would still be married to my mom.

I don’t mean to start a screaming match, and hope we can all keep things civil. I’m just wondering if there is any reason other than religion, and if religion is a good enough reason for some, how do we pick which one in a diverse society?

1) I’m 100000000% for gay marriage, but I just wanted to share a story of someone I spoke to about this.

He owns a business, and he was telling me that if his gay employees were allowed to marry, he would have to offer the partner health insurance, which would cost him (and “corporate America”) a lot of money.

I countered his argument by saying that homosexual couples are much more likely than heterosexual couples to both be in the workforce, as less of them leave the workforce to raise families. Therefore, they are more likely to each have their own benefits through their own employers and will not cause an additional burden to his company’s insurance as a heterosexual couple with a Stay-At-Home Mom or Stay-At-Home Dad would. Secondly, for every homosexual couple that decides to drop their individual health insurance and join his company’s plan, there is most likely a different employee of his company who will drop their benefits and join their partner’s. So in actuality, their insurance costs will most likely remain mostly the same.

One of the arguements I’ve heard that is religiously based is that it doesn’t promote “responsible procreation” and that a married couple essentially has the responsibility to bring children into the world and since homosexual sex doesn’t allow for procreation it isn’t responsible procreation. The hole in the argument then becomes, what about childless couples? If youcan’t have children are you not failing to support responsible procreation? If you choose not to have children are you not failing to support responsible procreation? If you choose to adopt as opposed to giving birth is this also a failing? If you choose to masturbate are you not fulfilling your duty to bring children to the world? Those things really apply to both straight and gay couples which means that if a couple doesn’t want to bring children into the world then they also shouldn’t be allowed to marry. To me it just doesn’t make sense and is one of the reasons I don’t go to church anymore.

And I also find it unfair that one group’s values should trump all others. They’re beliefs and lifestyle are not representative of EVERYONE so I subscribe to an each their own policy. You don’t have to masturbate or support gay marriage and I don’t have to go to church or avoid foul language. I don’t beleive in picking and choosing what’s ok and not and for who in particular. ESPECIALLY if I don’t subscribe to your religious beliefs (why should I be forced to adhere to them).

And even the argument that it “ruins the sanctity of marriage” is religiously based so, no, I don’t see anything other than religion preventing the legality of gay marriage. And while I feel the religious community is absolutely allowed to not religiously recognize a homosexual marriage, they aren’t allowed to socially and legally define it. That’s just me. It’s a simple separation of church and state and we shouldn’t all be required to adhere to the beliefs of religious ideals given we aren’t all religious.

Other than people just thinking that it’s “icky”… nope. Every argument I’ve ever heard against gay marriage has had something to do with religion. The same people who are making these arguments pick and choose which “rules” they choose to live by instead of following the bible to a T. If you’re going to discriminate against a whole population of people then you best not eat shellfish, wear mixed fabric clothing or get it on before you’re married. F’ing hypocrites.

i am ardenently in support of same-sex marriage, so i cant really offer any non-religious examples for you.

really i’ve never heard a non-religious argument for gay marriage that wasnt just a string of hateful slurs, and honestly most of those go back to the whole “the bilble says adam and eve, not adam and steve” line of thinking. *sigh*

Now that I think about it, my IL’s used the whole “reproduction” argument on me a few weeks ago and considering they’re not particularly religious, I guess this would be outside of the bible defense. My Father-In-Law & BIL, who aren’t exactly open minded when it comes to the gay population, said that being a homosexual isn’t “right” because they can’t create new generations. We then got into a bit of a heated discussion (I’m not someone you want to debate gay rights with) when I informed them that unless this couple is dealing with infertility, their argument is useless. A gay man can still have a biological child in the same way that a straight man can. The only difference is that the gay man needs to seek out an incubator. Same goes for a gay women except she needs to make a stop at a sperm bank. True, the couple will not create a child that is both of theirs but that doesn’t mean that individually, they can’t have biological children. The whole reproduction argument is particularly offensive to heterosexual couples who are infertile. Are they also “wrong” because they can’t have a child and create a new generation? Should they not have been able to marry because some people see them as “broken”? SMH

I actually know a few atheists who oppose same sex marriage, but honestly their reasons are kind of ridiculous.

One man just thought it was gross. He didn’t want to see two men kissing, or holding hands. I worked with him in a restaurant a while ago and he FLIPPED out when a man left him a number and a compliment on the receipt. Flipped out as in threatened to go follow him out and kick the shit out of him. I’m not sure he was mentally stable.

I have also heard a lot of “it’s just unnatural” arguments from atheists based on reproduction, fertility, and evolution, and some arguments based on traditional gender roles.

I don’t know, I personally love Christ (calling myself a Christian seems to make people go crazy so I’ll stay away from that one) and I just don’t understand what the big deal is. I’m very excited to have been invited to participate in LA Pride this weekend, even as a straight female.